Explanation:
Starting Thursday, there may be an
amazing new robotic explorer
on Mars.
Or there may be a
new pile of junk.
It all likely depends on things going correctly in the minutes after the
Mars 2020 mission
arrives at its new home planet and attempts to
deploy
the Perseverance rover.
Arguably the
most sophisticated landing yet attempted on the red planet,
consecutive
precision events will involve a
heat shield, a parachute, several rocket maneuvers,
and the automatic operation of an unusual device called a
Sky
Crane.
Thursday's
Seven Minutes of Terror echo the landing of the
Curiosity rover on Mars in 2012, as depicted in the featured video.
If successful, the
car-sized Perseverance rover will rest on the surface of
Mars,
soon to begin exploring
Jezero Crater
to better determine the
habitability of this seemingly barren world to
life -- past, present, and future.
Although multiple media outlets may cover this event,
one way to watch these
landing events unfold is on the
NASA channel
live on the web.
